June Lucille Forer (1917-2017) was born in Massachusetts to a Ukrainian-Jewish father and a mother with Lithuanian-Jewish and French-Canadian ancestry. From a young age, she dreamed of being an actress. At 12, she was cast to voice a character in a radio drama. By 15, she had become a regular radio voice actress, and two years later moved to Los Angeles. She soon had her very own radio show, and was known across America as “June Foray”. A decade later, she started working in film, and went on to voice countless beloved characters, including Lucifer the Cat in Cinderella, Witch Hazel in Looney Tunes, as well as Granny (owner of Tweety and Sylvester), Grandmother Fa in Mulan, Aunt May in Spider-Man, and Cindy Lou Who in How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Perhaps most famously, she was Rocky the Flying Squirrel (of Rocky and Bullwinkle), and voiced characters in Peter Pan, Woody Woodpecker, Tom and Jerry, Scooby-Doo, The Jetsons, The Flintstones, George of the Jungle, The Smurfs, and The Twilight Zone. Foray also appeared as a guest on The Simpsons, Family Guy, and many other shows. All in all, Foray worked on 19 radio programs, nearly 100 TV shows, and over 100 films. She also appeared in 9 video games, voiced many talking toys, recorded several children’s music albums, and wrote two books. Foray won an Emmy Award for her work, and played a key role in establishing the Annie Awards (for achievement in animation) and creating the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature in the Oscars. In fact, she was an Academy board member for 26 years, as well as governor of the Academy for a time. She founded the International Animated Film Society (which later named an award in her honour), and taught voice acting at the University of Southern California. She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and was featured in a 2013 documentary about her life called The One and Only June Foray. Foray worked well into her 90s, once saying, “My body is old, but I think the same as I did when I was 20 years old.” Sadly, Foray passed away last week, just shy of her 100th birthday. She has been called the “actress of a thousand voices” and “the First Lady of Voice Acting”. Click here to see a compilation of her voices.
Words of the Week
You cannot add more minutes to the day, but you can utilize each one to the fullest.
– Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Sol Price (1916-2009) was born in New York City to Jewish-Russian immigrants from Belarus. He grew up in San Diego, where he earned a philosophy degree at San Diego State University before getting a law degree from the University of Southern California. Price was admitted to the bar in 1938. After over a dozen years as a business lawyer, Price had an idea to open a new kind of department store, offering wholesale prices on quality goods sold in bulk. Price opened his first store, called FedMart, in an old airport hangar in 1954. He charged a small membership fee ($2 per family) and kept prices even lower by avoiding advertising, major credit cards, and expensive real estate, and maintaining a small inventory. The model was a great success, and Price expanded rapidly. He pioneered many innovations in retail, including being the first to sell gasoline at wholesale prices, and being the first to have an in-store pharmacy and opticianry. By 1974, FedMart had 45 stores and over $300 million in sales. The following year, FedMart was bought out by a German retailer, and Price was soon kicked out of the company. He then started a new chain, Price Club, in an old factory once owned by Howard Hughes. Price Club expanded quickly, too, and went public in 1980. A few years later, one of Price Club’s employees teamed up with a wealthy lawyer (whose own Jewish family was successful in retail) to start a competing wholesaler, called Costco. In 1993. Price Club merged with Costco to form PriceCostco, together having 206 locations and $16 billion in sales. By 1997, Costco became the official company name, and today, Costco has over 700 locations around the world, with 85 million members, and 174,000 employees. It is the second largest retailer, and the 18th richest company in the world, with $120 billion in revenue. Costco is second only to Wal-Mart. Ironically, Sam Walton wrote in his book that he “borrowed” most of his ideas from Sol Price, and called his store “Wal-Mart” because he liked Sol Price’s FedMart! Not surprisingly, Price is often called the “father of the wholesale retail industry”. He was also a generous philanthropist, having donated tens of millions to various causes, especially in his hometown of San Diego.
